Yes, I admit it. I like foie gras. I eat it with gusto. I wouldn’t say that I can’t get enough of it (because after a while you start to feel a bit sick), but it’s definitely moreish. Another slice? Oh, yes, please!
This is a trait that I share with Cheng Wei, who was, according to Chinese media, ‘a corrupt, deranged individual whose actions and behaviour were those of a common criminal.’ At one point, Cheng says, ‘The Arc de Triomphe and foie gras. Two great gifts the French have bequeathed to humanity.’
I wish to set the record straight. I do appreciate foie gras, but I repudiate every other aspect of Cheng’s behaviour. And even here I’d like to make an observation.
There are few people on earth as refined and cultivated as Cheng. But that particular assertion is wrong. Geese were fattened for their liver at least 6000 years ago. Exactly how they discovered that stuffing grain down a goose’s throat made the liver delicious remains unknown. There’s a case for thinking that some horrific sadist said to himself one day, ‘Hmm… Why don’t I cram a bucket of grain down that goose’s throat and see what happens?’
More likely is that he spotted that the geese in fact stuffed themselves. Before they undertook their migration, they needed a lot of fuel, so they guzzled it down before take-off. We’re talking the goose equivalent of an Airbus A320. If a goose got snared as it was taxiing along the runway, its liver would be fat – and delicious. From there it wasn’t long before they’d domesticated geese and fattened them up themselves.
My introduction to foie gras was through my mother-in-law’s. She bought it fresh from a local producer and cooked it herself to perfection. The way it slides over your tongue, the taste of it melting into your mouth… the supreme guilty pleasure.
According to the CIFOG (Comite Interprofessionnel des Palmipedes à Foie Gras), it’s a pleasure shared by 93% of French people, mostly pendant les fêtes, between Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve. In my wife’s family, as in most of France, the main meal is on Christmas Eve, le réveillon de Noël, and the consumption of foie gras with a sweet white wine took place as presents were opened.
France is by far the largest producer and consumer of foie gras, and after a couple of difficult years is heading back up to an annual production of 20,000 tonnes. If you’re thinking those difficult years were due to animal rights campaigns, think again – they were simply affected by bird flu. Not much wonder poor Marjorie Friche had to move:
The vegetarian Marjorie Friche announced her separation from her husband and now goes under the name of Harmony Meadows. With the money she received from her divorce settlement she funded a campaign ‘to end the intolerable practices of the foie gras industry,’ but her call for a boycott having no effect in France, she moved to California, where she set up the Heavenly World Institute, aimed at ‘promoting a simpler way of life inspired by the precepts of Jainism.’ She has written a lifestyle book and recently appeared on the Oprah Winfrey show.
Find out more about Cheng Wei, Marjorie Friche and the incredible story of foie gras in Mystery Manor.
